Formed in 1993, London Wharf PLC has forged a reputation for developing high quality homes in and around London and is one of the capital’s leading niche property developers.

Through meticulous detailing from the initial concept stages to final completion, bold innovative design, and the fusion of modern and traditional building techniques, has resulted in recognition by numerous industry awards.

Director David Lewin said ” We were delighted with the clean design and clear message of the original site but wanted to take advantage of the latest modern search engine optimisation techniques and the larger screen sizes now common.  Applause have now refreshed the site and provided advantage in design and optimisation.”

However the original site, designed to work well with the smaller computer monitors and dial up internet connections of the day, now needed a makeover to optimise today’s technologies.  AMD came back to us to provide design ideas and costings and once again chose Applause to carry out the web revisions which included a larger screen format, high quality images, interactive portfolio module and streaming audio testimonials.

The latest thinking on search engine performance,  social media marketing of the company and web analytics has also been integrated which enable the Directors of AMD to monitor and assess the return on their investment [ROI].

A further module is planned for the new year which will encompass full 3D flythrough of key projects.

Although cost is always a key element in any business transaction we consider that, in most cases, it isn’t the primary element because people want to do business with people they like, trust and can rely on. Of course they also want competitive pricing!

To illustrate my point, two clients with whom we have built such a relationship have just commissioned us to rebuild their website.  One originally developed in 2004 the other in 2006.  Sure proof of their trust in our reliability, competence and value for money.

Specifically they are using our services again because:

1. Doing business with us was a very positive experience.
2. The original work was of a quality and design to last 3 and 5 years respectively.
3. Mutual trust has developed over time because of our reliability, attention to detail and the level of support we have provided.
4. The price was right for the project both times.

Sceptical?  Check out our linked in profile where you will find testimonials from clients we have been working with for up to 15 years.   http://uk.linkedin.com/in/applause

There is just one way to create such a relationship and that is to build it. And a good place to start is with a phone call – 0117 933 4416.

Here are some of the ways we build trust and get Applause!

1. We do what say we say going to do.
2. We follow up and ensure you are happy with things.
3. We are interested in what you do.
4. We find out what you want and exceed your expectation.
5. We stick to the price.
6. We set out an understanding of requirement.
7. We communicate, communicate, communicate.
8. We are always helpful, the reward is always worth the time.

Like me you probably use search engines in two ways.  Your either searching for a product or service for yourself or you’re wanting people to find you when they are searching for a product or service that you provide. The search engine, for its part, wants to keep everybody happy by responding with relevant and useful information. Of course for every subject there will be thousands or millions of  pages, so to determine which are the most relevant the search engine analyses each and gives ‘brownie points’ or pagerank according to all the positive elements it finds.  When asked the search question it then presents those pages in descending order.

So ‘brownie points’ for our pages is what we’re looking for and a primary source of these are backlinks or links to your page from another page. Sources of these can be directory listings, forums, links from other web pages and published articles but vary considerably in the value (number of points) they give to your page. Consequently it is a useful exercise to understand how this process works so that you can intelligently apply the time you spend building links according to their value.

Let us take a look at how search engines assess your page.  Taking Google as an example when it analyses a page the first thing it will do is search for links to that page in its index, links on pages outside of the index will not be seen and therefore will not count.  Secondly, having found pages, it will look at the overall site pagerank (0-9, the BBC have a 9) then analyses them for local rank, that is, do they contain key words or phrases that are also contained in your page and the targeted search phrase.

Imagine someone gives you a  bag of ‘pick n mix’ at the cinema, you like big sweets (pr 9s), strawberry flavour and jellies; so you go through bag picking all the strawberry flavoured sweets and all the jellies  but the very best are the big strawberry jellies.

Ok so all our links will be big strawberry jellies – ideal maybe but tough, because likely these pages will be your competitors and they are not likely to provide you with links; and if you do get a link on the BBC site let me know how! But we can improvise our way round these problems by writing our own pages containing the keywords we seek and post them out to other sites with good page rank that will be in Googles index. And don’t forget, using my analogy, you will still be munching the other sweets in the bag.  Lesser links whilst not favourites still add value such as directories and social networking sites like LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter.

To summarise, think about the key phrases you want to be found by and the  relevance of the links you seek; manage your time between building easy links which can be done quickly, such as directories and social media, but don’t add huge value; and writing article submissions, building a blog, posting to forums and engaging in social media which do take time but provide high value.

Plan and execute your strategy carefully and be patient, Google aren’t known for speedy responses, and you will be rewarded with highly ranked pages which lead to more traffic and more business.

This is not unreasonable,  many SMEs have their work cut out managing the day to day running of  their business and actually getting the work done that pays the bills; and the processes involved in measuring the performance of a website historically have not been exactly user friendly.

Nevertheless consistent marketing of your business is key, especially in difficult market conditions and  your online presence is  one of the most important tools in communicating to potential customers.  So it is important to get the very best return on the time and money invested in it.

Now Applause has an answer to the problem; we are offering a free visual website profile that will give you a simple visual analysis of how your website is performing and how it measures against those of your competitors.  It will also tell you what you need to do  to outrank the competition and you can opt to receive a monthly update showing how improvements are affecting the profile on an ongoing basis.

Our FREE profiler presents the following information in a simple and easy to understand graphical format :  1. Three key tasks you can complete to improve web performance; 2. Your google page rank for your top ten chosen key words you would like to be found by; 3. your ten nearest competitor websites (very useful for subsequent analysis).

We can also provide an in depth analysis report which provides the following information:

Overview: SEO score, Content score, Visibility Score, Top 3 Issues, Key Performance Indicators, Keyword Analysis, Competitor Keyword Analysis, Links to research and related articles.

SEO Score: No of incoming links, Link authority, Keyword cloud, Link domain, Link domain extension, Dmoz listing, Yahoo listing.

Content Score: Internal/External link analysis, Content/tag analysis

Visibility Score: Best search engine positions by key phrase, Overview of visibility, Best SE positions, Monthly evolution reports, Graphical evolution key performance indicators

Competitor Analysis: Top ten competitor analysis by keyword/by search engine/by competitor

Keyword Analysis Tool

If you would like to out rank the competition and take advantage of our no obligation free offer call 0117 933 4416.

You have probably already acquired a Linked In, Facebook, mySpace or Twitter account established your profile and put up a photo of yourself or your business logo so that people who find you will get an idea of who you are and what you do.  You may also have fed your email address list into the social media software application to see if anyone you have emailed has a profile; and signed up for some groups that you feel are relevant to your business.  All of these techniques will build your network and set you on your way but in some instances can be very time consuming.

Here is a method that you may not have considered which involves querying Google with some structured search requests aimed at the specific networking software you use.  The idea is that every profile page contained on the web will have key interests listed.  Say for instance you run a small business selling rare formula 1 posters and catalogues, by searching for ‘Formula 1′ you will pick up anyone who lists Formula 1 in their profile.  You can locate people who may have an interest in your business that you would not easily be able to find in any other way.

Of course having found this information you will need to consider how you might introduce yourself.  You need to avoid being regarded just as a spammer and rejected, and of course in many applications there are penalties for this.  LinkedIn for instance will terminate your account of you persistently have people returning ‘I Don’t Know This Person’ in response to your introductions.  Perhaps in this example offer some free historical information or a list of rare posters you have to offer – just use your imagination to come up with an approach that will attract the person you want to connect with.  At the end of the day everyone registered with a networking facility is looking to expand their network, gain new information and connect with people.  Provided your approach is honest, respectful and does not amount to 500 words of ‘buy from me buy from  me’ people will respond to you.

Here is a list of search terms you can google.

Linkedin: site:linkedin.com inurl:in ‘formula 1′

Facebook site:facebook.com/people ‘silverstone’

Twitter site:twitter.com inurl:status ‘grand prix’

MySpace site:profile.myspace.com inurl:myspace inurl:fuseaction ‘cosworth’

Bebo site:.bebo.com inurl:profile inurl:bebo ‘vanwall’

For more information on web marketing call Applause 0117 933 4416

For more information:
www.setandstaging.co.uk
Applause web services

This will be a particularly useful cost reduction for small businesses wanting to move up from blueyonder, hotmail, yahoo etc web accounts to a more professional business .co.uk domain and email address.  Or to move existing accounts to a more cost effective host that combines professional hosting and web services with a personal client relationship.

We provide a wide range of options from simple blog hosting and personal domains to high bandwidth video streaming, e-commerce and business applications and are looking to build trusting and long term relationships with new clients.

Click this link for details of the offer

Customers will judge you by your website… and first impressions count. Research shows that you have just seven seconds to make that impression. Get it right and you’ll win business – often from unexpected sources. Get it wrong and you’ll be dismissed as amateur.

But funding a professionally-designed website can cause problems for the cash flow of the average small or start-up business. Here at Applause, we’re offering the best of all worlds: a ‘rental’ solution that allows you to significantly reduce the cost of generating a professional website, and then spread the cost over monthly payments.

www.999website-rental.co.uk is the fast, flexible and inexpensive way for business start-ups, small businesses, charities and social groups to create a powerful on-line presence. For just a £99 set-up fee and £9.99 a month, you’ll have your own domain name, a site with real impact setting out your organisation’s products and services – complete with images – and hosting on a robust server. You’ll even have your own dedicated email facilities.

You may not have the resources to fund bespoke web development, but you need to make potential customers sit up and take notice.  This is the solution that ticks all the boxes.

www.999website-rental.co.uk is based on a design template system: you simply pick your design from a choice of standard ones on offer, or ask us to take the style from an existing website, provide words and pictures then we do the rest.

What’s more, www.999website-rental.co.uk grows with you: if you want to upgrade or add features such as search, a news section or a search engine optimisation we’ll be there to do it for you.

We think it’s the smartest web design service currently available; and for anyone who hasn’t got a big budget to spend, there’s no